Holding Peace

Subhashis Mittra

The Border Coordination Conference between the Border Security Force (BSF) and the Border Guard Bangladesh (BGB)—an annual feature—this time too discussed various issues related to international boundary management. But this time the meeting took place under the shadow of at least half a dozen incidents of exchange of fire between BSF personnel and Bangladeshi cattle smugglers armed with illegal weapons barely days before the meeting.

Bangladesh PM Sheikh Hasina with Chief of Indian Naval Staff Admiral Dinesh K Tripathi

Just ahead of the commander-level meeting in July, there were three back-to-back incidents reported at the India-Bangladesh border in West Bengal. In two incidents, cattle smugglers armed with sharp-edged weapons tried to snatch the weapons of BSF personnel but were foiled. The BSF recovered cattle and swords from the smugglers.

The smugglers and other criminals have been taking advantage of the BSF’s non-lethal weapons policy in dealing with intruders at the Bangladesh border. On June 9, a cattle smuggler was shot dead when a group at the Kalamchera border outpost in Tripura tried to snatch weapons from a BSF constable after entering 150 metres inside Indian territory. At the same place on June 2, smugglers had assaulted a BSF jawan and fled with his weapon.

In another incident, Bangladesh smugglers armed with spears and swords entered the Indian side and tried to attack the BSF jawans near Malda in north Bengal. When they did not retreat even after BSF threw st